It often becomes necessary to install a pipe under an existing driveway or street, for example. Appropriate underground pipe installers are provided for this purpose, and an operating trench is provided on one side of the street or driveway for the installer device and a target trench is provided on the other side. A rod assembly, comprised of coupled rod sections, is driven by the installer device through the soil until a leading end thereof emerges into the target trench. A pipe connector fitting is then screwthreaded onto the tip end of the rod assembly, and with a pipe attached thereto the direction of operation of the installer device is reversed to pull the pipe backwardly into an installed position within the hole formed by the rod.
Often the pipe is greater in diameter than the hole forming rod so the pipe connector fitting includes an enlarged hole expander portion. Other problems are inherent with the pipe installing operation, for example, the soil may be very firm and well compacted, and when the hole is enlarged by means of a hole expander, an above road or driveway pavement, for example, may be buckled upwardly. To obviate this contingency, a generally tubular type of pipe connector fitting is utilized which permits the soil to flow into the pipe itself as it is withdrawn through the soil, and after the pipe is installed the soil is removed from the pipe by means of an elongated augar means. This is a standard practice.
The tubular pipe connector is interiorly screwthreaded to receive the screwthreaded end of a metal pipe for the installation operation. However, plastic pipes are being increasingly utilized, pipes of this nature such as PVC pipes are adhesively coupled and are not screwthreaded and cannot be secured by the interior screwthreads of the metal pipe connector.
Therefore, one of the principal objects of the present invention is to provide a pipe connector means for threaded engagement within a conventional pipe connector fitting of the aforementioned type, the pipe connector means including inner and outer rearwardly extended sleeves in a radially spaced apart relation and a plurality of circumferally spaced apart lock bolts to secure an end portion of a plastic pipe in a pocket defined between the inner and outer sleeves.
Another object of the present invention is to provide each lock bolt with a sharpened annular leading end to automatically form holes through the plastic pipe leading end as the bolt is being threaded into a locked position.